Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Top Five: Champions Online New Zone Wish List

An Alien World - If there is something to make a superhero feel truly epic, it would be to put them on another planet. You can do so many things there like fighting the evil dictator, stop an interspecies war, or confront a galactic power. You can also use the opportunity to make your hero start as an unknown and increase your fame as you take on your enemies.

An Alternate Millennium City - The alternate future is a classic trope in comics and Champions needs one. I want to see an alternate version of Millennium City under the thumb of Dr. Destroyer, patrolled by Destroyerbots, with a small human resistance fighting back. Want to make it really cool? Have the final mission end with the heroes being sent to reality just as Destroyer blows up the world. Hey, comics can be dark.

A Historical Time Period - I don't care when they choose, but adventuring with pulp heroes from the twenties and thirties, golden age heroes around World War II, or silver age heroes in the sixties would be a lot of fun. And you can fill out the history of the Champions universe.

A Large European City - London, Paris, Rome, Moscow, it doesn't matter which. Blasting villains in and around major landmarks would make for some epic set-piece battles. MMOs are international and superheroes (and villains) come from many places. Champions should reflect that. While you're at it, how about Beijing, Tokyo, or Hong Kong?

Small Town USA - You can blame this one on Ed Brubaker and his amazing run on Captain America. In one of the story arcs, AIM has set up an R&D facility in a small town in rural America and Bucky (since Cap was dead at the time) has to take them out. I love the idea of superheroes fighting crime somewhere outside of Manhattan, so a rural town with large tracks of pastures and farm lands would be cool.

Alien World = Galactic Champions. Definite possibilities. I'd like to see Ironclad's homeworld or the battle arena of Firewing's and Heculean's backgrounds.

Alternate Millennium City = Champions 3D. This is where I would like villains to start out when they become available for play. Gives them an area to build up in, doesn't require a lot of additional code (except for the dark building looks) and avoids the mistake that happened in CoH.

Historical - Golden Age of Champions. World War II vs real nazis, not the fake ones from CoH.

A Large Euro City - European Enemies/News of the World. You have to have Paris. It's too critical for Eurostar and for Gravitar. Paris is also a Viper hotbed, and Demon is looking for ancient relics in old Druid sites.

Small Town USA - Project Sunburst. The supersoldier program that developed the Silver Avengers was in Kansas. This is where Gigaton comes from, and could help introduce Photon, Anklysaur, and other 'rejects' of the program not yet seen in the game.

I'll add a sixth - another dimension or more. In the Champions Universe, there are 4 'near' dimensions of existence. In addition, there are two major, major villains more powerful than Doctor Destroyer sitting out in other dimensions. As the level cap gets raised, this would be a way to go.

@ Ardwulf - I've seen references to both a Moon zone and a Qliphothic World zone in various places, the implication being that they were cut during development. Hopefully that means they don't have to start from scratch with new zones.

I'm frightened of finding a Mirror Arcfire with a goatee.

@ Lightfinger - Thanks for pointing out all the pen-and-paper sources available. Cryptic will be crazy to pass up so much gaming history. Suddenly, I'm feeling my d6s calling me.

@ Zeno - Considering the Alien option for Nemesis minions, I think we should demand a Martian zone. Rally the troops! Who's with me?

@Lightfinger - Awesome stuff and great to see something that I certainly take for granted: that all this stuff in game does have a PnP tie to it and there's a lot of lore here that can be utilized.

I'd love to see a small town/rural area with a Lovecraftian vibe. You know the secluded cult worshiping long dead gods in the fastnesses of some rural area where a series of bizarre sacrifices and disappearances of the local township are connected to the resurrection of some eldritch horror.

But I somehow think that won't happen anytime soon. We'll get the alternate Millennium City, another dimension, or a moonbase/other world far sooner. I'm definitely going to look into these villains more powerful than Dr. Destroyer... Any websites where we can tap into this Champions lore?